


all is blue for a time

by taxicab12



Series: more to me than you can dream [5]
Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Anniversary, Established Relationship, Fluff, M/M, Pre-Canon, Temporary Character Death, obsessive discussion of a single color
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-15
Updated: 2020-08-15
Packaged: 2021-03-05 18:55:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 798
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25910182
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/taxicab12/pseuds/taxicab12
Summary: When he was a boy, the color of the sky is what had seduced him, open and endless and so much larger than his small mind could imagine.When he got older, it was the sea that stole his heart. The first time he saw it, he could hardly believe how deep it went, how deadly its calm waves could become.The day he died, it was the eyes of a stranger, not a sword, that killed him. Blue eyes, bright blue, shining out like the only light in a dark world.
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Series: more to me than you can dream [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1878034
Comments: 20
Kudos: 222





	all is blue for a time

"Let the blue sky meet the blue sea and all is blue for a time" -Moncy Barbour

...

Yusuf’s favorite color had always been blue. When he was a boy, the color of the sky is what had seduced him, open and endless and so much larger than his small mind could imagine.

When he got older, it was the sea that stole his heart. The first time he saw it, he could hardly believe how deep it went, how deadly its calm waves could become.

The day he died, it was the eyes of a stranger, not a sword, that killed him. Blue eyes, bright blue, shining out like the only light in a dark world. Yusuf hadn’t noticed the man’s eyes until after he’d struck him, or perhaps he wouldn’t have gone in for a killing blow. The man was going to die, those beautiful eyes gone instants after Yusuf had seen them. In a better state of mind, he would’ve backed away after striking such a blow, but he did not, intent on watching those eyes for as long as they still lived, which allowed the dying man one last chance at revenge.

Yusuf died, those eyes burned into his mind.

Then, he rose again, only to be struck down once more by those beautiful eyes.

They killed each other again and again until a tentative alliance formed. They became friends slowly, then later lovers, and every day Yusuf got to wake up to those eyes, to Nicolò, was a good day.

Every time he watched the light in those eyes fade as his lover died, his heart shredded itself.

“Joe,” Nicky said, sitting down on the sofa beside him, his arm instinctually wrapping around Joe’s shoulder. “That was Andy. We’re meeting them in Spain in a week.”

“She heard from Booker?”

“Apparently he’s the reason we’re going. He found us a job.”

Joe nodded, pressing a kiss to his arm. “Any idea how long it will take?”

Nicky shook his head. “We have somewhere to be?”

“Hmm, I was just thinking we should go somewhere nice for New Year’s,” he said.

”Special year for some reason?” Nicky said, smiling.

“You know,” Joe said, but elaborated anyway. “It’s going to be 1999. That’s nine hundred years since we first met.”

“Another year and it’s a new millennium,” Nicky said, but this was just a brief, idle thought. “Nine hundred years with you and still I long for more.”

Joe accepted his kiss. “My love.”

“Do you think there’s anything we don’t know about each other, after all this time?”

“What’s your favorite color?” Joe asked, not because he’d never asked the question before, but because Nicky’s answer changed every time.

“Red now, I think,” he said, then, as if he did not know, asked “what’s yours?”

“Blue,” Joe said, tracing circles with his finger around Nicky’s eyes.

“You always say that.”

“It’s always true.”

The sky had always been there, no matter what faded and changed. When Joe was young, it sometimes felt like the only constant.

“Joe!” Nicky yelled, then stumbled backwards, three quick shots to his chest.

“Behind you!” Booker called to him.

Joe spun around, feeling no guilt for ending the lives of the men who had shot Nicky. When they had fallen, he ran to his lover, who was just beginning to wake.

There were tears in Nicky’s blue eyes. “Joe, are you hurt?”

“I’m fine,” he said. “I’m okay.”

Those eyes searched him for wounds anyway, even as the bullets that had been inside him fell to the floor.

Joe didn’t remember his father’s face, his mother’s voice, his childhood home, but every time he looked into Nicky’s eyes, he remembered his first time seeing the ocean as if it were yesterday. Nicky could be as cruel as the ocean when he wanted to, but unlike the ocean, he had an endless capacity for kindness, for soft glances and sweet kisses.

“Happy new year,” Nicky said, handing Joe a glass of champagne.

“It’s not for another ten minutes,” he said, but took a sip regardless.

“Not so long ago, we wouldn’t have known the difference. Time’s gotten so specific.”

“Nine hundred years,” Joe said, instead of responding to that. “Can you even believe it?”

Nicky kissed him. “I can.”

“I’m so lucky to have you.”

Nicky smiled and his eyes sparkled in the dim light.

Nine hundred years ago, Joe had loved Nicky’s eyes because they were the color of the sky, the color of the sea. Now, he loved them because they were Nicky’s, the sky and the sea having become very distant seconds in things that defined blue for him.

They missed the exact moment that the new year began, but they were a little too busy to mind.

**Author's Note:**

> I’m not even sure if his eyes are actually blue, but I was halfway through this before I thought of that and don’t care. If they’re not, then they are now, and you just get to live with that.


End file.
